Yet another dog whistle to the many bigots among his base. Ramp up anti-minority policies to distract attention from everything else. Straight out of Putin's playbook.
Maybe they're good at their jobs? I have spent plenty of time around people in the service to know that there are a really good number of complete dumbasses in the military. When I was in bootcamp, I had one guy that got in trouble because he stole ketchup packets from the mess. Ketchup packets. That same guy got busted because he bought a watch and a wallet on our first trip to the PX when we had a very specific shopping list. He was a dumbass. Another guy failed the initial PT qual because he miscounted how many laps. That same guy got busted for sleeping in the nude. He was a dumbass. When I was training Oregon National Guard that were getting ready to deploy to Iraq, I was going over simple room clearing techniques and most of the guys I saw would get you killed if you were counting on them to watch your back. They didn't check their corners. They would stop in the fatal funnel. Not trained up at all. It shouldn't matter if someone is gay, straight, transgender, etc if they're good at their job. There are certainly a fair number of people who are totally shit at their jobs already in the military.
Well this is interesting. Everyone on the board in support of taking limp boner people into the military. The universal support certainly makes all of you sensitive people. So at the risk of being less sensitive, let me ask why the US Military "Needs" to do this to create the best force on earth when recruitment goals are met without doing so? Why would we Take limp boner people that want treatment into the military, while at the same time rejecting people that require too much dental work? How does the presence of limp boner people improve the combat efficiency of any unit they are assigned too? Can a limp boner person perform at a high level while under limp boner therapy? Or recovering from penile pump implants? If you were sending a relief squad into Benghazi to extract the Ambassador and the Consulate personnel, would it be beneficial to have a limp boner person on Viagra in the squad? Should the mission commander have to consider the possibilities of the above question? - Marazul
He took an unsupported claim from an antigay group that transpeople would cost 1.35 billion. They have ignored requests to substantiate and estimates from very non-radical groups like RAND Corporation have said costs much lower. And if he is focused on victory, what happened to his plan to defeat ISIS in 2 weeks? Actually I think having HIV might disqualify from active service, not sure - but Trump did not just say active service, he said ANY role. The military will now have to use resources to investigate and discharge currently serving transgender men and women. It is estimated there are thousands. The notion that this is disruptive is the exact wording used when President Truman ordered the military desegregated, exactly what was said when women's roles were expanded, exactly what was said when "don't ask don't tell" was repealed. Actually there was very little disruption, often below civilian business due to military discipline - whatever you might THINK, in the military you ACT as commanded. Trumps, of course, avoid military service. But never lose a chance to dishonor those who do serve.
You said - How does the presence of Transgender people improve the combat efficiency of any unit they are assigned too? If they're good at their job, they will improve the combat efficiency of their unit, regardless of whether they're transgender or not. The military needs good people. How does being transgender limit their ability to be combat effective?
Gender Dysphoria is a mental illness. There are thousands of medical conditions, and mental illnesses that make a person "unfit to serve". So I think people suffering from that would be deemed unfit to serve. Once you sign that contract though, anything that happens to you, the government is responsible for. So if you lie when you join, and they can't prove you lied, then there's nothing the government can do about it. So this isnt really stopping them from joining, it's just another mental illness in a long list of other mental illnesses that would prevent someone from serving.
Because it's icky! The bible says so! Men are men and women are women! DAMNIT, I WANT MY COUNTRY BACK!